Thursday, September 17, 2015

From ‘Don't Ask Any old bloke for directions. A Biker's whimsical journey across India’ by P G Tenzing

That was my life. Spent in groping around areas I didn’t know
or care about. And having to deal with the vicious in-fighting that goes on
inside every government I have ever served.

Dechen went out yesterday to a celebration of the Gurung New
Year, and met a clouded leopard on the way. The way to greet a leopard around
here is to scream bloody murder and run like hell. The cat eschews the
screaming part but runs like hell in the other direction.

The number of accidents on Kerala’s roads is one of the
highest per capita in India. The obvious reasons are narrow roads, habitation
throughout the road length, too many vehicles, over-speeding and drunken driving.
Over-speeding is the crux of the matter, and here the typical Malayali ego trip
comes into play: I can drive faster and
better than any fucker on the road.

The traffic eases as I reach the district of Palghat. I see
a man pee on the side of the road. This is the rarest of rare sights in Kerala
because of the density of population – and the general absence of the penile
exhibitionism rampant everywhere in the country. I stop the bike and pee in
joyful brotherhood with him.

Food. Food in Kerala is to die for. Fish, chicken, pork,
beef, whatever, all cooked in delectable coconut oil. Except putte – a rice-based cylindrical piece
of poison which can choke you during breakfast. I suspect this dish was created
to get rid of guests who overstay.

Tamils are extremely courteous, Everybody is a Sir. A young
woman on a scooter told me that my side-stand was up. The only unknown woman to
engage with me on her own initiative throughout the journey – if you discount
the obscene gesture made to me by a prostitute somewhere in north India.

Tai Chi has always fascinated me. ….Looks easier than it is.
Much easier. The system is very hard on the hips and the balance required is
phenomenal.

I’d replaced the jeans I’d worn earlier with baggy cotton
pants. Jockeys, I found, were the best undergarments, because even a minor
crease around the posterior can play havoc after a few hours. At times I’ve had
to raise myself from the bike to give air and solace to the weeping twins.

The government services are generally reviled by the
chattering classes and, at times, rightly so. However, in defence of the
services, I have to say that many officers work hard and honestly under
extremely adverse conditions and still make a difference in the lives of some
of the poor of our land. That is the gospel truth. I swear I have seen saints
at work who could make you feel worthless. On the flipside, there are also
those ghouls who enter into a macabre dance with pot-bellied netas.

I was to live in a village with the Santhal and Kolha tribes……The
staple diet is mostly watery rice with salt. A special occasion is marked with
a feast of boiled edible leaves from the forest along with raw onion and
chilly. And most of the work is done by women, while the men drink the blues
away. …..The strange thing about this village is the cleanliness. No garbage.
They have nothing to buy from the markets, so there is no refuse. There are no
cats and dogs in the village, because there is no food for them. They would be
competition, in fact, for a source of protein: field mice. This is a part of
India we rarely see or hear about. There are millions of such people without
hope. I sense a great betrayal from our side. ……An enduring image of my visit
to Bhalupani was that of an old lady leaning on a walking stick, carrying water
to her hut from a well. Back and forth. Again and again. She had no relatives
and survived on handouts from the villagers.

Kolkata is a crazy place. Its premier football clubs have
different fish as mascots, and the price of these in the market shoots up or falls
with a thud depending on which team is the winner of the match on a given day.

The guy has spent his life in the pursuit of sex and the
conclusions he’s drawn from his experiences. ….his theories….having sex with
your wife daily ensures her fidelity to you; the act of sex is the best
exercise because every part of the body is involved (including yanking at your
partner’s hair, which constitutes a scalp massage); the trick to finding out if
a woman is faking an orgasm is to look for a faint flush on her chest; women
are horniest after eleven in the night; the way to delay ejaculation is to
press the depression between the asshole and the balls.

A Buddhist funeral in Sikkim is one messy and long affair. The
mourning period is a full forty-nine days. In between, we had to take Dad’s
ashes to Bodhgaya …..the holiest place for Buddhists. I felt a blast of energy
pass through me inside the main temple. I have never been the same since. Don’t
ask me what happened that day. I don’t know, except that it was Dad’s parting
gift to me……

Stay in the smaller hotels outside town because you will always
get a room. It will be cheaper than the central places, and you will be treated
well by the staff.

I know that there is a divide between the honest and
dishonest officers in all the states. The honest ones are losing the battle on
a daily basis. Some stay and fight every single day. Others look away and
manage to keep their own noses clean. Some are looking for a way of moving out
of the system somehow.

There is a serious lack of policy-makers in this country, a
paucity of long-term thinking, and of think-tanks…..somehow, the country
stumbles along.

He was the type of singer who looked deep into your eyes,
probing for signs of adulation.

At an accident site near Purnea town, hundreds of people had
gathered on the national highway. They had burnt a truck that had mowed down
three pedestrians, and were throwing rocks at the policemen at duty. India at
work. I quietly slipped away.

Two other sights on that stretch stayed etched in my mind.
One was the lines of bare, shitting asses all along the highway…. What with the
floodwaters raging below them, there was nowhere else for these poor people to
go. The other was scores of dogs run over by trucks on the road, both in Bihar
and Bengal.

A study of the bureaucracy would reveal a surprising number
of clinically depressed people – roughly 25 per cent, I’d say. All of them
square pegs hammered into round holes.

The chicken-neck to Assam was a long and ….wet ride. Passing
through the tribal countryside was interesting. Women looked you in the eye
boldly. This was a change for me.

I meet Keralites all over the country at the oddest places.

I got talking to the waiter with the grand name of Morning
Star. One of the attractive things about people in Meghalaya is that you never
know what sort of name will next be sprung at you. From Evening Star, Hopping
Stone, General and Captain to Oneboxstar and Cabinet.

Contrary to popular belief, mindless violence does not
happen all the time in Bihar. I was greeted and treated well in that state of
earthy people. You just didn’t act funny with them – or you lay yourself open
to losing a limb or two.

The roads in south India are far better than those in most
of the rest of the country.

I wonder why nuns have to look so serious. Loving Jesus
should make them smile.

Today, on the west coast road, was a day without public
transport and I was happy to give lifts to people who asked. Unlike some other
states, Kerala provides a safe community and there was no hesitation on my
part.

Goa is very different to the rest of India. The religion,
dress, the emancipation of women, its architecture and its ocean of bars, all
set it apart. The roads are narrower but well kept.

…Rajasthan…I landed in Beawar. I found the people of the
region simple, with an innate sense of hospitality.